...T. J. Pempel Ending the LDP Hegemony: Party Cooperation in Japan . By Ray Christensen . Honolulu : University of Hawai'i Press , 2000 . vii, 228 pp. $27.95 (paper). Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 2001 2001 BOOK REVIEWS JAPAN 209 for the country's greater good...

...Ellis S. Krauss; Robert J. Pekkanen Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 2010 2010 The summer 2009 electoral victory of the opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) over the long-ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) holds historical significance, not only for political...

... government manage to continue spending liberally on public works while at the same time maintaining low budget spending? The former allowed the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) to maintain majority position by satisfying its constituents, while the latter allowed the Ministry of Finance (MOF) to have a sound...

... volumes. The first half, "LDP Rule, 1955-1980," approaches a vexatious level of detail on Japan's political parties. The second half, "The Dynamics of the 1955 System," provides a thematic account ofJapanese political history. Those looking for an explicit model ofJapanese politics will be disappointed...

... influence. The other has been a long-standing, increasingly experienced, and cautiously pragmatic contingent of Liberal Democratic party (LDP) leaders and legislators. Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 1989 1989 Masayuki Fukuoka . Nihon no seiji fūdo: Niigata Sanku ni miru...

... and postwar parties and both chronicles and explains the party mergers of the 1950s, the multiplication of parties in the 1960s, and the appearance of an apparently stable imbalance between a Liberal Democratic party (LDP) that wins about half the vote in lower house elections, a Socialist party that wins...

... detailed examination of the LDP's rise. Key political events covered include the revision of the U.S. Japan security treaty, Ikeda's income doubling policy, the rise of public concern for the environment, and challenges to the LDP Diet majority. Masumi's discussion of pending pollution legislation...

..., Inc. 2001 2001 210 THE JOURNAL OF ASIAN STUDIES Communist Party (JCP) united to form an anti LDP government. That coalition instituted electoral changes that have substantially altered the character of Japanese electoral and party politics. In the near term future, he contends, the LDP may remain...

... Democratic Party (LDP), and, instead of lumping the four opposition parties together and calling them "progressives," as the editors do, he distinguishes between leftists (the socialists and communists) and centrists (the democratic socialists and supporters of Komeito). Gary Allinson's study of the cities...

... Democratic Party (LDP) leadership recruitment, fund-raising practices, interest-group activities, and election-campaign behavior. The central theme is that the party-political system of Japan has a high capacity to combine policy change with political stability, primarily because of contrasting...

... have the co-authorship between an academic economist and a banker to thank for that. I would recommend this book to anyone who ever thought, even for a moment, that Japanese banks were about to dominate world markets. FRANCES ROSENBLUTH Yale University Ending the LDP Hegemony: Party Cooperation inJapan...

... this version and the previous ones is that, unlike others which either look at the power triangle among the LDP, state bureaucracies, and big businesses, or focus on leading politicians, this study centers on the LDP and the election system. They argue that the multimember districts voting system forced...

...); $17.50 (paper). In the 1990s Japanese institutional politics was marked by a series of remarkable developments. These included the 1993 ouster of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) after twenty-eight continuous years in office, the formation of a coalition government comprising all opposition parties...

..., Japanese Government), so that we which have been made elsewhere." The else- could get a more concrete understanding of Oc- where is, of course, the LDP, government min- cupation politics. Vague references to confused istries, the Cabinet, and probably Akasaka. premises, unquestioned doctrines, and innocent...

..., bureaucratic, and political party leaders), intra-elite (e.g., LDP factions), and center-periphery (e.g., Diet members and their electoral constituencies). Richardson finds constant tension between conflict and fragmentation on the one hand and consultation, coordination, and negotiation on the other, rightly...

... conclusion he ignores or briefly dismisses a host of other factors that will influence the number of parties that Japan will have. Wada next explains how selection methods of the president of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) changed over time. Again he challenges the prevailing explanations...

... of the state and the composition of the ruling social coalition. Because the Japanese state is cohesive and centralized, it is strong or autonomous in relation to society when compared to other nations. A conservative coalition of big business and agriculture supports the ruling Liberal Democratic party (LDP...

... of the Liberal Democratic party (LDP) and the opposition parties and their demographic characteristics (geographical distribution, age, career and educational backgrounds). He discusses factions extensively, frankly acknowledging their positive role and berating Western critics for using a narrow ethnocentrism...

... case is also distinctive in that the number of these families has grown over time. Moreover, Smith points out that these dynasties are mostly within the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), the conservative party that has governed Japan either in majority or in coalition for most of the postwar period...

... reversed to some extent in a conservative direction through direct LDP intervention. Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 1994 1994 List of References Masatsugu Andō . 1975 . Gengo Seisaku Ronkō [A Study of Language Policy] . Tokyo : Yūzankaku . Eastman Carol . 1983...